Well where do I start.
As some of you witnessed earlier I had a slight rant in game and logged off. There was a very good reason for this rant, I hate liars and elitism!
I have been playing this game for 4 years now. I have been in The One for 2 years (with a slight mini break when i thought the grass was greener!) Up until a few weeks ago my gear really sucked and i barely did anything to up my game and try and improve. Then I figured why not try and improve and see if maybe you can join the odd raid and see some end game content. So thats what I did. Along with my trusty partner in crime Shiva, we farmed HC's and improved our gear. I sorted my spec and spell rotation and got enchants, asked advice on gems etc etc.
So, this evening I was randomly asked/told 2 join up for Team Crimson Fury's ToC 25 man raid. I did. I watched videos and read tactics on the net. It then turned out the main raid leaders wouldnt be on tonight so i thought i say dont invite me if not needed, its my first time and i dont want 2 be a hinderance. I got told if they needed DPS id be considered. I was then asked what my DPS was, i told the person and then asked what my spec was. I didnt hear anything back. In guild ppl were asked if anyone was free to tank/heal ToC25. Some DPS'ers answered they were free. I was then whispered back and told 'we are now full with the main raid teams DPS but please feel free to sign up for more raids.' Fine i thought, till i noticed that the ppl who had offered their DPS services were in the raid. That hurts. If i wasnt wanted in the raid why wasnt i just told that, instead of being lied 2?
Another thing that narks me is the fact that if u ask if anyone wants 2 do a HC u come up against a wall of silence in Guild chat then see that others have joined HC's together. Am i really that bad?
I have spoken to an officer this evening and we both feel a meeting between GM's and raid leaders would help us sort out and understand why we have developed a 'if your face fits' kind of attitude.
I know i can be slightly dizzy at times, but I do as Im told and I listen and just really want to have a blast at end game content.
And yes, I know what you'll all say, people have offered to set up raids so i can see end game stuff and this is appreciated, but it would be nice if this was done when Im available and not when Im slogging my guts out at work. Then i return home, get invited to the raid and after 2 bits of trash the raid is ended. Nice! And if i remember rightly the raid i joined up 2 do the raid weekly quest in Uld i was quite near the top of the DPS list!
So please, take into consideration us non elite raiders who put the effort in to maybe be allowed to do the odd raid now and again?
Xylo
Xylo
i know excatly how you feel hunny, in the last 4 n half/5 yrs i been playing its happened to me a lot not just in The One but in the other guilds as well.... i spoke to officers of my concerns befor and as you were told there should be a meeting but nothing seemed to happen. this is one of the few reasons i let me account expire back in december.
Updated by
Jan 30, 2010 11:30
Hi Xylo.
It sounds like you had a bad week, with a bunch of things combining together. I'm sorry about that. Let's see what we can do about the various issues you've raised here.
I'm going to respond to your posting, Xylo, in chunks, so that people can use the "Reply To This" link to comment on a specific issue, as your posting covers four different areas.
BTW: Thanks for posting a coherent account of your concerns/worries. While I may perceive things differently from my vantage point, I obviously can't know how others see things if they don't tell me. And what I don't know, we can't try to fix.
I don't know what happened there. Some quick initial investigation revealed that the Crimson Fury run for that evening turned out to be an absolutely mess in terms of organization. I'm not clear yet on who actually did lead the raid or even if that was the person you talked to. It does not sound like the raid ran as expected or in even a vaguely typical fashion we'd normally expect from one of the experienced THB raid leaders.
This is a THB issue, so I've asked
Shinytoaster, one of our two THB representatives, to investigate it for you. That's part of the job of a THB representative. You, Shinytoaster, and the raid leader may end up meeting to discuss it together or it may be sorted out some other way. Shinytoaster will discuss it with you to find out more details (like who you talked to) and then talk to the raid leader about what's happened.
hey Xylo,
i dont know if this makes any difference now, but your name did come up in the discussion to fill the dps spots, but i dont know what happened, perhaps you were afk for an invite or something similar, not entirely sure there, i just assumed that cos you werent in the raid there was a good reason for it.
No Shek,
I was never AFK at any point from start to finish of raid invites!
I was told after discussion with the RL(i think they were RL) that if DPS was needed I would be considered! Then they invited other people who hadnt signed up!
There was a good reason for my non invite, I wasnt wanted, lol!!
umm.. im clueless then lol
My intention was that this was supposed to be done so that you would be able to attend. I delegated it to
Sonarakbedak explicitly saying that you needed to be one of the attending people and could he please set up something. I will admit that I did suggest a Saturday as possibly being a good night, but I'd sort of expected him to check with you about availability. I only said a Saturday because that's a raid-free night normally, so people would potentially be available.
When I arrived on, I think, Sunday evening (maybe it was Saturday?), he was in the process of finding people to go. I asked about you and he said he knew all about you, so I assumed he had talked to you and something had been arranged. I'm sure he'll be able to add some additional commentary here.
We'll be able to organize some more to which I hope you'll be able to come. Ideally, I'd like to see at least one guild raid run a week, but we'll need to find either a person able/willing to lead one all the time or a pool of people willing to take turns. Good nights for such events would probably be Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays, or Saturdays, as those are currently not being used for large raiding teams. Tuesdays and Thursdays are definitely out! They're packed! In any case, I'll start a separate item to discuss/recruit volunteers for that.
There are also some drop-in runs in THB going on Mondays/Wednesdays for Icecrown Citadel 10-person. I know you didn't have gear appropriate for that when I looked previously, so I had to turn down your offer to come with us one night, but I did check your gear first and I told you so. I've just had a look again and it looks like you've jumped up a pile since then. So, in terms of gear score, you should be fine for one of those runs now. Not sure about your DPS, mind you, as I can't evaluate that just by looking. (-:
So feel free to pay attention on Wednesday or Monday evenings for Basil's call for people for that. Wednesday is the first night for it with the follow-up on Monday. So generally people who go on the Wednesday get priority for the Monday, if they're available. If Basil can't fit you in one week, he may tell you that you have priority the next week. That's what happens when we have too many people volunteering. There is no sign-up sheet for the drop-ins. They're on the basis of whomever's online, appropriately geared, and wanting to go more or less, subject to some raid balance requirements (x number of tanks, x number of healers, etc).
This I've certainly seen, both in the guild and, to an even greater extent, in the THB. I think it's actually a complex issue. I know, for example, that there are some people who never volunteer in public, but are happy to come help if you ask them privately. Kanine (Roses of Dawn) is an example of a person like that. Why doesn't he volunteer if you ask in public? Maybe some people just like to be asked personally? I don't know. We have some people in our guild who don't talk much in public, but are apparently very verbose via messages. Perhaps they fit into that category as well.
Another reason is that, certainly, within the guild, we have "social clumps". These social clumps may be formed of people who know each other in real life or perhaps are on raid teams together or have some other ties joining them together. They prefer to group up with other members of their social clump, which they may have arranged previously or just have a general understanding that they'll all go together if they're all online. That's likely what you're seeing happen when you see people run off suddenly.
You can probably empathize somewhat, as you have your own tiny "social clump", made up of you and Shivà. Other clumps include me and Basil; Derthon and Breicor; Luna and Gawaine; Popcorn, Kari, Wikket, Luna, Gawaine, and Harlequinne; Gerrardicus and Leony; Giouvou and Sathem; and many others not detailed here. Clumps sometimes group together in large clumps, as in the case of Luna and Gawaine. Anyway, my point is that we have a large number of smaller and larger clumps within the guild. That has its good points and bad points. The bad side is that sometimes they don't much go outside their own clump.
Some people are happy to go off and do things even if they are part of a clump, if they have the time or aren't busy working on something else. I don't mind going with groups of people, but I have to admit that my time is in pretty short supply. I do also try to sort groups out for people and let people know when someone in the THB channel is looking for people. I did that for you fairly recently, for example, pairing you and Shivà up with Gimlinox, someone else, and then finally a tank.
In the past, I've tried to designate some nights as being guild run nights for 5-person groups, but that never quite seems to take off well. I'm open to other suggestions that people might have.
I think Leony and Gerrardicus are often doing stuff together and needing people. Perhaps you and Shivà could pair up with them more often? They have tanks/healers. Then you'd only need one more person. There are other such combinations possible too. It's just a matter of figuring them out and that requires some communication, perhaps beyond just an occasional guild channel request, which only goes to people online at the time. I'd suggest starting by chatting privately with Leony about good days/times to perhaps group up to do things together.
I agree that it would be nice if people said, "Sorry, I can't right now because I'm waiting for bleah for something we arrange to do" or "Sorry, I'm trying to level my priest, but I'd be happy to come along in a few hours." or whatever. Just say something, so people don't feel like they're being ignored. Not that this happens all the time, but I agree it does happen often enough for me to have noticed it.
All in all, though, I don't really think it's a "personal" thing in that people think you're poo or something. I think it's more "personal" in that people may not know you and people often prefer to group, at least initially, with people they know. What we can do is encourage people to make more of an effort to at least group with other people from time to time and encourage people to respond in some way to requests in the guild.
This sounds again more like a THB issue than a guild-specific issue. I discussed it briefly with
Basil (Roses of Dawn), THB co-coordinator, yesterday. We weren't sure there is/was a "if your face fits" kind of attitude. We thought it was more the whole social clumping issue with people preferring to go with people they know, but we're prepared to be wrong!
There is, however, a meeting of the raid leaders regularly scheduled for the last Sunday of the month. So, as it happens, there's one this weekend. These meetings are composed of recognized team raid leaders which may or may not include people ad-hoc organizing spur-of-the-moment raids (which might have happened on Thursday). With that in mind, what would you like us to say to them? What would you like us to say to GMs?
Thanks for the reply Elsh.
Ok, so my response (I have typed all this gumph once but my comp crashed mid response and I lost the whole dam lot! Typical!) Anyhoo........
My gear has improved, alot, and thats for the reasons I outlined. I dont expect to be 'carried' around instances etc so I thought Id make the effort to be a semi viable member of the THB, who, if needed could attend some raids and HC's. My DPS is currently 2.8-3.2k self buffed in HC's. I cannot tell you what it is when raid buffed in my current gear as I havent raided since i improved my gear. I have now however reached the limit of what I can do with Emblems of Triumph, and would like to get some Frost Emblem gear, but with only getting 2 Emblems per daily HC completed this is becoming a very very slow task! Im never going to be a 4-5k DPS as I dont and wont be able to attend enough raids to ensure this happening!
The farce of the raid on Thursday night obviously just sparked something and angry Xylo was unleashed! Im a grown up with broad shoulders, and can take being told my DPS sucks and jog on! I know some ppl find lieing to others an easy way of dealing with a potentially difficult situation, but liers always get found out......and results such as my rant and the above post happen!
Sonar and I did not discuss the raid on Sunday night, as I wasnt around all day (perks of a 14 hour shift at work I guess!) I was very thankful to be invited (afer 3 bosses had already been downed), but sat around whilst people were AFK and then killing some trash, dieing, rinse and repeat then one wipe on the boss only incurred me a massive repair bill, when I actually could have been doing something more beneficial with my time! This does not mean however that if there will be future drop in raids and people are happy for me to attend that i wont, i'd bloomin love to! But what people also have to understand is that Naxx, VOA and OS (i think) is the only places Ive been so anything more than that are all new to me, but I will put the effort in to learn tactics and try and not mess up!
The social clumping thing I understand. Me and Shiva, for obvious reasons, will always come in a pair if we're both online. Im the reason he's on this server. Even when we were doing HC's I always used to ask in guild if anyone wanted to join us, because if anyone is like me, they hate PuG's! But ive given up now, and unfortunately take the PuG route, as the wall of silence was getting just waaaaay to frequent! I will however take on board your comments and start whispering people. But, if your going to be part of a guild, and a guild alliance isnt it just good manners to respond to someone? No thanks usually works well for me!
Finally, the THB meeting. All I wanted aired Elsh is my comments and see what others think. I know I am not the only person who feels this way. I wont name names as it is up to them to dicuss this if they want to. I think bringing to peoples attention that there is unrest in the ranks will help the issue to be somewhat addressed and dealt with?
I think that is all areas covered?
Over and out
Xylo